Harvest (43 page)

The door knocker didn’t sound
again.

Maureen’s stomach writhed with
unease. Something was out of kilter. It wasn’t as dark behind her
eyelids as it should have been. She opened her eyes and could make
out details of the room much more clearly than she normally could.
She turned sharply to the lamp. The bulb was glowing like dull
embers. She felt for the switch. It was off. There was a hum. Not
of electricity, but the sound of vibration. The lamp was trembling,
as was the alarm clock. She could feel it in the bed also.

Maureen sat bolt upright
as the lamp suddenly began to rattle and then quake on the bedside
cabinet. Her ears began to fill with the sound of her blood rushing
through her veins. The lamp became lifeless again.
What had caused that… that possession? Ol’ Nick
at work?
Maureen surveyed the dark shapes within the
room looking for phantoms and beasts among the shrouded furniture
and corners.

She wrestled with her
anxiety; the sound of her blood was growing in her ears, reaching a
crescendo.
Only it wasn’t her blood.
It was a faint howling.
The
wind,
she dismissed
. There
was a broken window at the end of the corridor
outside.
That was it.
No
– no it wasn’t. It was in the room with her,
coming from her headboard. A glowing arm lanced up either side of
her before she could investigate. She screamed a dry cracked scream
as elongated fingers laced firmly together around her mid-section,
she quickly pulled at the gristly bones but made little impression
on them. The mattress gave way into nothingness as if a trap door
had opened and the arms snatched her down into a swallowing blaze
of green light.

The light bathed her, wrapping
itself around her in a cloying embrace that soaked through her
nightclothes and became close and warm against her skin leaving it
tingling and itching. Maureen clenched her eyes as her face became
smothered by the pressure all around her body. She pursed her thin
lips against the softness that threatened to fill her mouth and
lungs. Her eyes flicked open and a cramped green world of shadowy
shapes pressed itself against her eyeballs. Maureen thrashed to
fight free, but the surrounding translucent liquid that suspended
her upright mired her movements while the itching of her skin
progressed to a distracting stinging irritation.

Her vision focussed while she
struggled against the confines of her new world and some of the
shapes became sickeningly recognisable as bones and limbs, then
something infinitely more familiar; a child’s face, her neighbours
girl Moll Dancey, her eye sockets empty her face slowly drifting
away in the liquid like tendrils of slowly melting dark ice. The
girl twitched suddenly and Maureen withdrew in terror from the
child who seemed to still be alive, only to see the girls head
disintegrate abruptly, coming apart completely in a slow moving
brown-reddish murk in the wake of her sudden movement.

Maureen gave up the last of her
held breath to scream, only to be silenced as she sucked in
mouthfuls of the viscous liquid that was burning deep down into her
skin. She swam as furiously as she could, but barely moved within
the tight claustrophobic embrace of her surroundings. Desperate
panic raced through her as she choked on the thick environment that
now reached inside her frail body and delicate lungs and she found
her nylon night dress breaking down, dissolving around her body in
coloured streaks in the liquid around her.

Maureen’s fingers finally found
a firm boundary in her cramped vertical enclosure and scrambled at
it, panicking for release from the nightmare as her veins burned
and a great pressure bore down on her fragile chest with the lack
of oxygen in her body. The pain pressed itself deeper into every
nerve ending and her vision began to darken. She scratched at the
pliable membrane that kept her sealed in.

Finally something gave way
under her fingertips. With excitement she carried on digging and
squinted through a brown haze that now filled her vision around her
hands, her hopes turned to horror as she saw her skeletal fingers
at the centre of the murk as the swirling tracks of her skin
threaded away. Maureen withdrew her wasted hands from her work,
finally accepting her fate as her strength left her and she gave
into the consuming black vacuum within her chest as she starved of
oxygen. Thick clumps of her own flesh broke away, dissolving as it
drifted past her eyes as they closed to the world for the last
time.

Rachel realised that although
Cat had invited her into her flat she wasn’t going to be invited
beyond the hall. Considering the damage the lounge had taken there
probably wasn’t anywhere comfortable to sit anyway. The hall was
narrow and it was hard being so close to Cat and not be able to
pull her into a hug and have the reunion she desperately dreamed
about. Cat’s sharp eyes, stern face and tightly crossed arms
compensated for any closeness their proximity created. Rachel
coughed through strangling emotions, knowing that any weakness of
tears would be scorned. “You have been in a coma for a little over
three weeks –.”

“
Yeah I
know.
Old
news.
”

“
While
you have been in hospital a lot of bad things have been happening.
People have been going missing with no explanation – from behind
locked doors in some cases.
Children,
” she paused searching for a reaction,
but if there was one she hid it well. “There have been strange
happenings, with the lights and tricks of perception. Some violent
deaths too.” Rachel rushed an explanation of how she had been drawn
into the events. “But some weeks before Claire Chambers even called
me and I found out about you being in hospital, a stray kitten made
its home with me. When your neighbour let me in I realised it was
your cat.”

“
Psychic-
fucking
-lassie?”

Cat’s invective caused Rachel
to blink. “I thought it might be a sign that you needed me.” Rachel
added.

“
But, I don’t need
you.”

Rachel tried to swallow against
the constriction of her throat from Cat’s words but they didn’t go
away. “You wanted help.” Rachel justified her conclusion by
relaying the events at the hospital with the plea for help within
the coffee and the waking nightmare she had experienced. “You may
not need me on a terrestrial level, but on a spiritual level,
whether that was subconscious or not I think you were willing to
take any help you could get. Because what happened to you seems to
be linked to what is happening in this building I wanted to talk to
you to find out if you had any insight that could help us in our
investigation.” Cat stared at her, apparently waiting to see if
Rachel had finished.

“
I don’t have any
insight,” she said roughly. “I could check the tea leaves or look
at chicken entrails a bit later and get back to you.”

Rachel studied her loafers.
Cat’s damage and bitterness wouldn’t allow her to help even if she
could. Rachel was surprised she didn’t feel anger; just pity: here
was a girl selfish enough to put her own petty position in an
ongoing standoff in the way of helping others. “You heard about
Harry I take it,” she found herself saying, purely for something to
say. She saw the sudden change of direction confused Cat.

Cat grinned spitefully and
pointed through the lounge doorway to the large plastic covered
windows. “Yeah, he ran about twenty feet in that direction.”

Rachel could play her game. She
adopted the clipped tone she reserved for disciplining children.
“Yes, that’s right. He jumped off the roof. About five minutes
after you told Craig that there was something in the flat with
Harry.” Rachel saw she had struck Cat’s guard aside.

Cat looked everywhere but in
Rachel’s direction. “I don’t remember that happening.”

“
Crap,” Rachel stated
bluntly. Cat looked stunned by her uncharacteristic curse and her
comfort in its delivery. It was good for Cat to see that she had a
hard side. Rachel took full advantage of Cat being dumbfounded by
Rachel’s change of tact. “We have established your antagonism
towards me. Now get over it for the moment. I’m not here to ask for
reconciliation. I just want to talk to you about what’s been going
on and if you have any insight. If not we can sort out returning
your cat and key and I will go.” It was agony to be so firm when
all she wanted to do was repair the rift between them, but despite
the guilt she had stayed strong.

Cat’s mouth was open, her jaw
set forward and firm, her eyes staring away at an angle. “When…
When I got back here after the hospital I could feel something was
wrong with the building. Something bad. I didn’t know where or what
it was, but as I walked I just knew I was getting close to whatever
it was.” Cat uncrossed her arms and planted her hands on her hips.
She looked unhappy with herself for talking to Rachel. Close to
tears. “I went to Harry and Craig’s floor and I just knew that
whatever that badness was it was with Harry in the flat, playing
with him – Taunting him. I think Harry was like the guy at the
hospital, being controlled by something. Except this time Harry was
being Harry again, fighting back. It knew Harry was lost, so it
made Harry run – and he kept running, until he ran out of ground.
Then it let him go…”

Rachel needed time to process
what she had heard but she knew she couldn’t lose Cat. “And what of
you Cat? What happened to you for you to end up in the hospital? Do
you know that?”

Cat turned away,
she knew
.

Rachel pointed at the carnage
of the lounge. “You’re one angry girl, but even you couldn’t do
that much damage. It came for you. A ball of green light. It lifted
you up and then it poured itself into your head. Why did it do
that? Do you know?”

“
How do you know what
happened?” There was fear in Cat’s jade eyes, but also a renewed
anger that burned like green fires.

“
I had a vision when I
was here. I sensed something like it in the Chambers’
homes.”

“
What happened? Do you
know?”

“
No.”

“
You do. What happened at
the hospital, with Malik? Please tell me.” She realised her voice
had been desperately insistent and as Cat stiffened and disengaged
she knew she had pushed too hard. She could hear the desperation in
her voice, and realised the depth of her own despair; what was
happening in this building had turned her world upside down – she
needed Cat to tell her anything she could so she could rebuild her
understanding and confidence in the spiritual world. Without the
spirit world what would she be? A lonely old woman? Most of her
friends were from the spiritual church she attended and communed
for or were linked to her paranormal interests. If she found that
world too frightening to engage with, even on an investigation
level what would she have? Her part-time job at Sainsbury’s and her
tipples. How small and lonely life would get. She would have to
start out again. “Please Catherine.”

“
I don’t remember and I
don’t know anything.” Cat stated bluntly.

Rachel channelled a frustrated
sigh into a slow exhalation and spoke calmly. “I think you do, and
I think what you do know frightens you.”

Chapter
Thirty Two

Kelly strained to read the
lines of her book with aching eyes. They felt small and deeply set
as tiredness tightened the muscles around them. She leaned forward
out of her warm duvet cocoon and sat the unsatisfying book down on
the table and rubbed at her weary eyes that were ready to give in
to sleep. She ran her fingers through her hair and let it fall
about her head and face. How long had it been since she had felt
someone else’s fingers in her hair?

Craig groaned lightly in
his sleep and Kelly squinted at Craig’s huddled form on the sofa in
the darkness. He moved.
Maybe he was
uncomfortable?
Kelly stepped out of the duvet and
padded over to Craig.

She had always thought that
people looked younger when they slept, but strangely Craig looked
older than his twenty-four years. Twenty-four! His age didn’t bare
thinking about.

His face was pale and drawn.
Something wasn’t right; it was like looking at the face of a
corpse. Fear ran like spider-legs scuttling across her pounding
heart. Was he breathing? She wanted to shake him, shout at him, get
him to react to show he was alive, but also didn’t want to panic
him, or make him think she was a crazy woman. She withered down
onto her knees and felt the form of his still body through the
duvet and gently nudged him.

Craig’s body snapped upright
into a sitting position, and she yelped and fell away from his wide
and mad eyes. The spark was back and he had the glow of life about
him, but his reaction to her waking him was as if she had brought
him back from the brink. The wildness faded from his eyes as he
tore his way back into consciousness and became aware of his
surroundings and Kelly. He cursed several times, ran his hands up
over his face and back down again, he looked panicked and
uncertain.

“
Craig? Craig what’s
wrong? Did you have a nightmare?”

“
People being killed and
taken. Lots of them.” Craig leapt up and climbed into his tee-shirt
and jeans, threw on his trainers and began thumbing through his
mobile. “Kelly, get dressed we have to get out of here.”